


Time Moves So Slow

by Memories_of_the_Shadows



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Almost No Dialogue, Canon Related, Canon-Typical Behavior, Character Study, Complete, Implied/Referenced Murder, M/M, Pre-Slash, Wordcount: 1.000-5.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-28
Updated: 2020-08-28
Packaged: 2021-03-06 15:48:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,237
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26161414
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Memories_of_the_Shadows/pseuds/Memories_of_the_Shadows
Summary: Hannibal is good at being alone.  But that doesn't mean it is by choice.
Relationships: Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
Kudos: 21





	Time Moves So Slow

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from "Tea For One" by Led Zeppelin.
> 
> I do not consent to my work being hosted on any unofficial apps, especially any with ad revenue and subscription services, or any website other than ao3 unless I personally cross-posted a work.

Hannibal--from a time when he was very young, possibly even from before his Mischa’s birth--has always wanted to share his life with someone. A singular person who could look at him and find love, comfort, and a lifetime of shared experiences.

It had not always been the kind of secret, double-life it is now, and the life he had been happy to share with Mischa--what little of it they’d had before that pig had taken her away--was child-like and idyllic. Much as he wishes she was still alive, he knows she would not fit into the life he’d built in the ashes of her sacrifice.

His aunt--and uncle, he can see with perspective that he lacked in his teenage years, that the man had far more to do with taking in a half-feral child far more used to the wilderness of Lithuania than the finery of Paris than his childless-by-choice, elegant, much younger wife--had taken him in, taught him.

Robert had taught Hannibal the pleasures and joys of _society_ , how to subsume the wildness in his heart underneath layers of fine dress and finer tastes. It had been Robert who had given Hannibal his first experiences of art, theater, opera, fashion.

Murasaki, on the other hand, taught Hannibal to _use_ his inherent violence, revel in the fight, see what beauty there was in broken things. “Become kintsugi,” she had said to him once, tipping a favorite tea set off the table, watching him stare at the shattered remains, the tea soaking into the carpet. “Embrace that you are broken, and become more beautiful for it.”

Months later, that tea set--now lined in gold where the pieces connected, different, but far more lovely in its difference than it ever was whole--sat on their table and Hannibal believed himself in love with Murasaki, consumed with the belief that surely, _surely_ , she was the one person who truly understood him. Chiyoh--his confidant and perhaps something like a friend--had listened to him, encouraged him in a way that Hannibal thinks Mischa might have had she lived; as full of romantic notions as any girl her age might be.

When he finally approached Murasaki, though, she was horrified by his passions, rejected him utterly, and torn between his wife and his nephew, Robert sent Hannibal to Florence. Chiyoh came soon after, a punishment or a gift, Hannibal has never been sure.

He’d defied Robert’s order only once, a trip to Lithuania, ostensibly for closure on the subject of his family. That’s what he told Chiyoh when she asked, and in a way it was true.

Revenge, though, sweet and thick on his tongue like blood--Mischa’s blood, that he drank in that unknowing stew, and the blood of the pig who killed her that he craved--drove him to the home of his birth.

Sweet, loyal Chiyoh followed him faithfully until he crossed even _her_ suitably lax ideas of appropriate revenge--teenagers are so easily molded by the society they keep, and Chiyoh and Hannibal only had themselves, Robert and Murasaki, and a host of pretentious pigs to keep themselves occupied, and of those, only Robert was gentle and kind, the most aloof of them all--and then even _she_ , Hannibal’s last friend in the world by then, turned away.

Hannibal returned to Florence, alone.

In Florence, he threw himself into art, culture, tried to discover himself as a separate entity. A lonely god, fit company for everyone and no one.

He took pleasure in art and in death; frequenting gallery openings and museums during the day, stalking the streets for victims of convenience at night.

It was a lonely life, but a pleasant one. Hannibal answered to no one but himself and learned many things.

That buried longing for an equal, a partner, drew Hannibal to the ‘Primavera’. Zephyrus, the lonely god of wind, native to nowhere and nothing, yet accepted everywhere: who made for himself an equal out of Chloris. A marriage that elevated her to that of a goddess.

The pigs he used to make an homage to Botticelli’s work out of were the first ones he’d tried in years, his first art installation ever, though many complimented him on his sketches and he was entertaining the scholarship offer on their merit. To leave fair Florence was in no way an easy decision. Inspector Pazzi’s astonishingly correct guess was the reason he’d left, in the end: Hannibal has learned to be more careful in his appreciation for his installations’ muses and for which the dear Inspector will likely pay when the time suits Hannibal.

That couple--strangers at first, perhaps, but no more, not after the gift Hannibal gave them--were far from the last, although both his individual style and his cooking have improved since.

America was both easier and harder. There were few indeed who deserved their pretensions, fewer still who understood anything akin to manners, but far more who could be tempted to the societal ideal of depravity, and, well, manners could be taught after all.

Hannibal plays game after game of wit and violence, his art installations and his learning, and when that loses its interest, he lays out feasts of rude pigs and boorish sheep and invites the curious so-called elite, the harried law-keepers, and those who study his kills in vain hopes of understanding him. They devour the evidence they seek and pray for more, more.

Not a one of them shows anything more than morbid curiousity in the Chesapeake Ripper--as he was named by the tabloids, almost an insult but an amusing one nonetheless--and an impudent proprietariness towards Hannibal himself.

The buried longing for a partner almost never troubles Hannibal anymore. He is content with his life of luxury, with his games, with his reputation.

It still shows itself, though, in his decorations.

A large house, fit for much more than the sole man who occupies it. Considerations allowed for another's taste in his own eclectic design, where things may be easily added or moved. A chair in the room he spends the most time in, allowing someone to occupy his space without encroaching on it.

And yet, there is no one.

Far past the time when Hannibal has given up any hope of finding someone to truly build a life with, he meets Will.

At first, Hannibal only knows that Will is intriguing. A _true_ empath: though only for killers and dogs. A social recluse: who is one of the most popular professors in Quantico. An intelligent, acerbic man who only rarely lets people close. That he is classically beautiful in a way that would have had many painters begging for his time and attention in another life is merely… appurtenance.

When Hannibal looks at Will, he is reminded very clearly of Murasaki’s tea set. So clearly that Hannibal can almost smell the tea she preferred, hear the chiming of the porcelain. But Will is like the tea set before the crash, and Hannibal wants to know what he looks like _after_.

There is such beauty in the teacup that, once shattered, is able to gather itself up again. Stronger even, perhaps, for the fall.

And if they should fall together?

Hannibal believes that the mix of their shattered pieces would make the most beautiful art installation, the most beautiful tea set of all, never to be truly parted.

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this as a form of organizing my thoughts about Hannibal and with the bunny of his kitchen armchair because the set designer on this show is a gift from a hell god and deserves all the praise in the world.
> 
> If you'd like, come visit me on [tumblr](https://sachinighte.tumblr.com/)!


End file.
